


TGR Friendship Exchange 2020

by SantaManana



Category: Choice of Games, The Golden Rose (Interactive Fiction)
Genre: But deep down inside...., Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Gift Exchange, but only to CERTAIN people, eye emoji, slight angst, they say my MC is a softie even though he's a grump, they're kinda right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:48:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24512605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SantaManana/pseuds/SantaManana
Summary: Gift fics written for TGR Discord's Friendship Exchange Event
Kudos: 2





	1. For Crow

**Author's Note:**

> Want to learn more about the MCs I'm writing? Check out the TGR MCs sheet created by Crow (feather-x-crown): https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1F6fhUAJxAYdupsXjT-yJ6Y3UiofCZx5k-sq-EZ7rNIY/edit#gid=0

Shadows with long, spindly limbs and claws the size of scythes reached out to Odette, tearing at her dress, laughing and taunting at her.   
  


“ _Hélène!_ ” they shrieked. “ _Come back here!_ ”

“ _You ungrateful child! You had everything anyone could ask for!_ ” 

“ _Riches! Power! Finery!_ ”

“ _All you had to do was say ‘yes’ to the marriage!_ ”

“Stop!” she sobbed as she ran onwards, desperate to find any exit in the darkness. “I never wanted any of that! He was a monster and I wouldn’t be his prisoner!”

The shadows continued to jeer at her, their eyes full of red malevolence. “ _Little bird~,_ ” they sneered, “ _Yes, a little birdie flying away, that’s all you’re ever good for~. Fly, fly, fly away. But know this._ ”

“ _We will never let you go. And back into your pretty, pretty cage you will stay._ ”

Odette jolted awake with a gasp, her heartbeat hammering away in her ears and her cheeks wet with tears. She rubbed furiously at her eyes and tried to calm her breathing down.

Another nightmare. Only a bad dream—but no one around to comfort her. Odette tried to tug the blankets tighter around herself but it was no substitute for the arms she wished were around her instead. His broad, warm chest that felt like a shield against every worry in the world. His large hands cradling her protectively and stroking her back in slow patterns. His warm laugh that bubbled up like a sunrise as he kissed her and called her “love.” 

Odette missed Hadrian with all her might. But Tarek had seen fit to separate them for this month’s assignment: he to the west and her to the east. Two lonely hearts, longing to meet over the hundreds of miles. For weeks, she missed him fiercely, like her heart was stretched over the vast distance between them, tearing at the seams. The worst of all aches.

The tent felt too stifling now. She needed to go out or lose her mind with every second her throat stayed choked up. She slipped outside of her little tent and shivered as the cool night air chilled the sweat on her skin instantly. The air was still and silent with no breeze to disturb the night, only the sounds of light cricket chirps and snores coming from her friends fast asleep in their own tents.

There was movement that caught her eye, among the flickering flames of a small fire in the center of camp. It was Qathar on watch duty, wielding a quarter-staff. Odette stood transfixed as he practiced drills, twirling and swinging the wooden staff with equal parts power and precision. With how ferociously he moved, it was as if he embodied fire himself, passionate but dangerous. 

And then his eyes turned to her.

Odette _eep’ed_ and nearly stumbled in shock. She felt a blush rise quickly to her cheeks, mortified to be caught staring. Odette found herself beginning to shake even more under Qathar’s focused gaze. 

_Oh no, he’ll think I’m such a creep, staring at him like that! Pull yourself together, Odette!_

“I—, evening, Qathar!” She attempted a weak smile at him. “It’s so l-lovely out here t-tonight, that I.. came to look at the moon!”

He gave her a flat stare. “...The moon.”

“Y-yes! I—, I wasn’t looking at you at all, the moon was so big and bright tonight that I had to...” and she trailed off as she glanced at the sky and to her horror, saw the crescent moon hanging high above, feebly casting its pale light onto them.

She stammered again, trying to backpedal, but panic and the fear from the earlier nightmare overrode her mind and brought frustration with it. The stinging in her eyes was familiar and tears threatened to leak again. _First the nightmare and now this... Oh Odette, you really can’t do anything right this night._

“I’ll...leave you alone then,” she whispered in defeat. “I’m sorry, I won’t be a bother to you.” Oh, how she wanted Hadrian to be here. Oh, how she wanted not to seem weak in front of Qathar. She turned back so she could cry alone in her tent.

“Wait.”

Odette stayed frozen where she was, but slowly swiveled her head to see Qathar walking towards her, staff tucked under his arm. She shrunk down her shoulders almost instinctively. 

He stopped shortly in front of her, watching Odette with an unreadable expression on his face. 

“You cannot sleep,” he stated simply.

“N-no,” she stammered. “I’m fine.”

“You are haunted.”  
  


She turned to face him. “...That’s not true.”

“You miss him.”

Her arms came to wrap around herself as she shivered. “Qathar, _please_.”

“You are afraid.”

“ _Stop!_ ”

The night was frozen silent. 

He remained standing motionless in front of her, still watching. Odette shakily exhaled, then gingerly relaxed her fingers so the nails no longer dug into her skin. Ten crescent moons in her arms, to match the one in the sky.

“...Yes. I’m all those things. I’m tired. And lonely. And—, and—.” Tears began falling down. She raised her hands to cover her mouth so she could stifle a sob as to not wake anyone else.

Qathar swiftly crossed over to the log in front of the fire, where he had draped his cloak over it. He exchanged it for his staff and then came back to Odette.

“You are cold.” She watched with wide eyes as he gently draped the cloak around her shoulders. He carefully fastened the clasp around the front, securely wrapping Odette. Instantly, her body stopped shivering as it relaxed in the warmth of the thick cloth, filled with the residual heat from the campfire. He fished out a cloth from his pocket and offered it to her. Odette cautiously took the soft cloth and used it to dab at her face, blotting away her tears. 

Qathar stepped away, hands clasped politely behind his back. She was no longer under his stony scrutiny. His gaze was... calm. Understanding. Odette sniffled again and clutched at the cloth, suddenly shy of her outburst.

“...Thank you, Qathar,” she smiled weakly, “I’m sorry you had to see me like this.” A fragile laugh slipped out. “I guess I’m too soft-hearted and not cut out for—”

He held up a hand and she fell silent. Qathar’s face turned thoughtful as he pondered on his next words.

“...It is true you are soft-hearted. Dangerous, yes, for our work. But not a bad thing. It means you are capable of kindness, of love. They are saying there is the greatest strength in these things.”

He shifted on his feet, looking slightly uncomfortable for the first time in this strange conversation. “But kind people are capable of sorrow as well. But they think they do not deserve to feel it. They are ashamed to cry. Like sorrow is... is...” he trailed off.

He scoffed, evidently irritated at not finding the right words. He tried again.

“You do not have to tell me why. But do not lie when you are full of sorrow.” 

Qathar finally turned away from her and went to retrieve his staff. “The night is long. And we are far from dawn. I shall be continuing training. You go to sleep or you may watch. Or—,” and he looked sideways at her, “we sit by the fire and I can be telling you a story from my homeland.” 

He lifted a shoulder in the smallest of shrugs. “Your choice.”


	2. for Sarah

One day, Qathar asked Arsinoë to tell him about her homeland.

She studied him for a while, her head tilted and her gaze contemplative. He stared back patiently, knowing she would come to her own response in time. 

“Why?” she finally answered. 

“I would like to know of your home through your eyes.”

She shook her head. “I could tell you of Constantinope,” she admitted, “but there are things there that you would have to experience for yourself. It’s like...finding a meaning for a word with no translation.” 

“Then please, be teaching me some Greek,” he countered. “You have knowledge like me, that there are things we can say only in our native words.”

“You’re not afraid? It shall be difficult.” 

“If I am not having the chance to travel to Constantinople, then at least I will have some awareness of why you miss it.” 

She sat still for a while, then slowly nodded, finally relenting. And that was the start of it.

* * *

Each word she taught him became a memory, little parts of herself that he noted and stored away carefully. 

**Κόκκινος** : the color of the rooftops in the Queen of Cities. Once, as a little girl, she had spent an entire day observing the bricklayers as they kneaded huge pieces of river clay, pressed them into molds, and then laid the roof tiles out to dry in countless rows like soldiers in formation. 

**Μεράκι** : to describe the care and devoted love in handicrafts, the hours the artisan must have spent zealously embroidering the golden designs in her cloaks, each thread a tale of blood, sweat, and tears of satisfaction. 

**Νόστιμο** : to say after eating goat cheese, tart and earthy. The stronger the taste, the better the meal, she claimed. It was a snack she hoarded almost obsessively to eat by itself or to spread onto toasted bread. 

**Βράζω** and **μουσκεύω** : steps to make chai, a drink she preferred to have in the mornings to wake herself up. And after this lesson, he quietly ventured into the market and learned to haggle with the merchants to get loose leaf black tea, a medley of spices, and milk. 

(He thought of the kiss she gave him after he had shared the tea with her, thought of the softness of her full lips as it pressed against his own. It was strange that it did _not_ feel strange—only that it felt right but gone too soon, like having a good dream but not quite remembering it when you woke up.)

And in turn, somehow Qathar was opening up and finding pieces of himself that he thought were long gone, little trinkets from his past that he could give in exchange for these lessons. He told Arsinoë of a boyhood in the desert and gazing in rapture at the endless stars that glittered above. He told her of growing older and being forced across the seas, looking up at the night sky as he sailed farther away and wondering if the stars he saw were the same as the ones from the home he could never return to.

The months passed and they fell into an easy rhythm. They learned how to read dangerous languages together and by extension, learned to read each other. She calmed him down when he grew furious over the weapons left in disarray after the recruits were done training. He watched her back with his keen archer’s eyes and stopped her many times from triggering traps “for research,” as she called it. Missions, translations, exploring, and sparring—the days passed peacefully and together they watched the antics of their fellow mercenaries with wide eyes. 

And then the Day of Friendship came upon the Company. Suddenly, everyone was in a gift-giving fervor, and so Qathar found himself outside Arsinoë’s room, holding a large package bound in twine. He trailed his fingers over the paper wrapping, visualizing the beautiful cobalt blue cloak inside of it.

Friendship? Was that really the word to describe their relationship? It seemed too weak to articulate the bond between them, their solidarity that went deeper than the quiet words, comfortable silences, and secret smiles they shared. Perhaps they were... what was it that Amelia had said? “Best friends?” 

Qathar gently placed the package down and knocked on her door. He silently walked away while musing on this holiday. Friendship. It was a strange word: one that seemed wrong to describe him and Arsinoë. But it would have to do for now. 

* * *

“Qathar, you move αργός today,” Arsinoë called out, not harshly but with the simple audacity of the truth. She was looking down at him from the top of the Devil’s Bridge while he was stuck clinging to its side, hanging onto nearly-invisible edges of the stonework. Normally the nimbler of the two, he would have already clambered up the walls—if not for Arsinoë’s excitement propelling her long limbs up the sides of the ancient aqueduct. She moved with a barely-contained intensity that Qathar had only seen her reserve for artifacts (and goat cheese). 

“I am coming when I can,” he called back. He gave her a flat stare and she stared unabashedly back, still unimpressed with his speed.

“Give me your hand.” She stretched her arm down to help him up the last part of his climb. As Qathar prepared to reach up, time seemed to slow down. It was as if the world had shrunk down to encompass only the two of them on this bridge. Her gaze seemed to burn into his own, and a thought settled in his mind, like the last tesserae sliding into place and completing a beautiful mosaic.

_Oh,_ he thought, _this is love._

Later on, there would be injuries: scrapes from when they slid almost vertically down the collapsing bridge, cuts and bruises from when they painfully tumbled onto the ground. There would be worry when Qathar hurriedly searched for her amidst the centuries-old rubble; nonchalance when Arsinoë dusted herself off and grabbed Qathar’s hand to pull him towards the cave uncovered by the wreckage.

But what Qathar would remember the most from that day was how radiant Arsinoë was. How the glow of a late-afternoon bounced off her wild black curls and glowing bronze skin. How her expression remained placid but her amber-yellow eyes were wide with fierce delight over the possibilities of what they were climbing. He was stuck dumb by how happy she looked, and how much he liked seeing her like that.

In the future, Qathar would come to realize that this was the moment he would follow her anywhere. The romance books were wrong: sparks and stars did not burst into the air the day he met her, but all the same, he had the premonition that Arsinoë would be someone unique. But this moment on the bridge was when his mind realized what his soul had always known. Qathar, the man who was fine living among shadows and shunning the company of others, was now helpless to do anything but chase after the light that Arsinoë cast wherever she went. Qathar wanting, for the first time in many years, to walk in the sun again.

If it was with her. Always her. The signs were so clear now—how patiently the universe must have waited for Qathar to notice, how it must have laughed when the friendship he felt for her slowly crystallized into something more. He wanted to laugh along, at the obviousness of it all, but instead he did the next best thing.

He smiled at her. And he reached for Arsinoë's open hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> αργός = slow
> 
> Me: They're [redacted]  
> Sarah: *untelligible screaming*


	3. for s4fira

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was actually written after the Exchange Day, but I wanted to still show appreciation to s4f and Amelia. Because who wouldn't?

Amelia huffed, blowing her bangs out from her eyes. Then she winced as her bandaged middle ached. Being alone in the camp’s medical tent—and with broken ribs to boot—was just so... _so..._

“Boooring,” she called out to the empty air. Not even the doctor was here to entertain her—Diana had left minutes ago, muttering something about restocking her supplies—but not without a strict order to Amelia to absolutely not move. 

Amelia laid back down in her cot and stared daggers at the tent flap covering the entrance, the only obstacle to sweet freedom. Her injuries weren’t even that bad! Just a couple of bruises and three broken ribs from the last skirmish, nothing that a salve and wrappings couldn’t fix. But when she tried to explain as much to Diana, the glare that the one-eyed woman had fixed her with was so murderous that Amelia quickly shut her mouth before Diana performed surgery on her and “accidentally” let the scalpel slip. 

“Disappointed that you are not outside?”

A shadow peeled itself off from the side of the tent. Amelia watched as it approached her cot and raised a hand up to slip the hood of its jacket down, revealing a stern face with strong features, dark eyes, and a pale scar that stood out against his brown skin. Qathar took a seat by her cot and leveled a curious gaze at her, his eyes flickering to her body in a silent question. 

Amelia pouted. “Heya, Qathar. I’ve got broken ribs and Diana isn’t letting me back into work for a few weeks.” She brightened up as an idea came into her mind. “Hey, do you think—?”

He shook his head and Amelia slumped down in disappointment and whined. 

“What’s the point of your death glare if you can’t use it on Diana to make her clear me for the job?”

Qathar scoffed. “Diana is right. With the injuries you are having, you should not go back to battle. And besides, it is not good that I encourage you to go back to fighting when I was—, when you became hurt because of me in the first place.”

“Oh, come on, I told you I didn’t mind! I should have finished those guys off quicker so they couldn’t try to get you!” 

Qathar grimaced, remembering what had landed her here in the first place. He had been foolish enough to let his guard down when it seemed like the battle was over. The air was silent, the bodies on the ground were quieter still, and the ravens whirled around in the air, preparing to feast on the corpses. Qathar was too busy scanning the field for arrows to refill his quiver that he hadn’t noticed that a survivor was rushing at his back. By the time he turned around to see the bloodied, half-crazed man running up to him, Amelia had rushed forward with a mighty yell to intercept the attacker’s assault. However, while she was dealing the finishing blow to the enemy, another straggler bull-rushed her with a shield, crashing into Amelia full force and knocking her to the ground. In the ensuing struggle, Amelia’s bandana was torn away and the enemy had raised her shield, intent on bashing her again—but not before Qathar shot her down.

He hurried to change the topics; after all, he had come to visit her for a reason. “Something I have for you,” he gruffed. From his pocket, he pulled out a large square of mustard-yellow cloth. He folded it diagonally into a triangle and laid it in Amelia’s lap.

“A new face wrap. Plain, but perhaps you may be asking Lucia to embroider it for you.”

Amelia felt her jaw drop in surprise as she cradled the bandanna in her hands. She didn’t know her fabrics like Lucia but even Amelia could easily tell it was of good quality. It wasn’t especially beautiful to look at but soft to the touch. She knew it would serve her well—quite like her friend to prefer function over fashion. She giggled inwardly at the thought of Qathar at a tailor’s stall, arms crossed over his chest as he examined the fabrics with a critical eye. Maybe glaring at the shopkeeper too to get a better discount.

Happiness bubbled up in Amelia’s chest, a wellspring of merriment and joy so potent that if not for the medical tent’s quiet policy, she would have whooped with joy. Qathar! Had gotten a gift for her! How could anyone call him grumpy and stone-cold was beyond Amelia’s understanding when the proof was right in her hands. 

She could feel happy tears springing up as she lunged to grab Qathar in a hug. She, of course, ignored the sharp pain in her midsection protesting at the sudden movement.

“Aww, Qathar! I love it! Thank you so much!”  
  


“Amelia,” he grunted as he felt his windpipe being cut off. “Let. Go.”

“But you need more hugs! Bea and Lucia said so!”

“Let go or the bandanna I take back.”

Amelia instantly released Qathar. He leaned back and rubbed his neck to massage away the lingering remnants of Amelia’s unholy grip strength. He leveled his usual glare at Amelia. “Never be believing what those two say about me.”

“Okay!” she chirped. “More hugs in the future! Thanks again!” 

Qathar rolled his eyes while Amelia hurriedly tied on her new gift. However, he couldn’t fight a small smile from forming when she flashed two thumbs back at him, evidently pleased with her newest accessory. 

“It looks perfect! And the best part? Now we can be Bandanna Buddies!” she cheered.

He shrugged nonchalantly. “Sadly, it was not today. As the mission was not for spying, I am not bringing it this time to hide my face.”

“Next time then! We’ll look so cool next to each other in battle!”  
  


Qathar’s lips thinned as he inwardly sighed at Amelia’s enthusiasm and how he was about to dampen it. Oh well, the truth needed to be said sooner than later. “There may be no next time,” he said. 

“Wait, why not?”

“You think you will survive when Alessa learns of the injury upon the return of ours?” Amelia instantly grew pale at Qathar’s words. Her fingers curled tightly in her lap and her shoulders hunched forward, like a turtle retracting into its shell. There was no doubt that Amelia was imagining Alessa’s cold disappointment and her lectures. 

“...please tell me where I can hide when we get back from this mission,” she said quietly.

“No promises, but I will try.”

  
  



End file.
